"By using current slang terms, Dunbar is trying to tell his children, 'I'm 'hip' or 'down', and you can talk to me about anything,'" Mayhan said. "He is unaware that his stilted speaking style, belabored references, and frequent incorrect usage of terms leave his children more confused than reassured."

Having characters speak in Totally Radical slang is often annoying. It can be excruciating when the slang is outdated, misused, or just spoken wrongly. But sometimes, the other characters find it just as phony as the audience does.

This is when a character starts speaking like a Jive Turkey in an attempt to sound cool or relevant, and comes across as neither to other characters, who react with disdain (often Totally Radical disdain).

Examples

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Advertising

This Tim Horton's commercial for tea that is "steeped". A woman is under the impression that "steeped" is a slang word after being told that her tea has been steeped. Needless to say, she goes around saying the word to everyone.

Anime & Manga

The Pokémon anime did this to Jesse and James in an episode where the duo was trying to convince Ash and crew to get on the SS Anne. James called the cruise "Totally Radical," with Ash wondering who uses "radical" anymore.

In Millennium Snow's first volume, Chiyuki says that what Toya did for that little child was "dreamy." Toya reacts by yelling "No one uses dreamy anymore!"

In the live-action Scooby-Doo movie we discover that monsters are possessing humans and being taught to blend in by watching videos of people using expressions like "what up, dog", "yo Red" and "y'know what I'm sayin G". This backfires because it makes them stick out even more.

In Shrek the Third Shrek uses slang to try talk to Arthur, who just freaks out further and screams "Help, I'm being kidnapped by a monster that's trying to relate to me!"

There's one scene in The Last Dragon where Bruce Leroy is trying to infiltrate a group of shady factory workers by pretending to be cool. While practicing his intro, he repeats the line "Hey my man, what it look like?" in various tones and enunciations.

Inverted in Son in Law when Grandpa Walter, after looking askance at Crawl's endless stream of slang throughout the movie, unexpectedly cuts the film's primary antagonist down to size with a flawless slang soliloquy and instantly becomes the coolest grandpa ever.

Designer: (to assistant) Make a note of that word and give it to Susan...

Literature

In one of the Ms Wiz books, the three Paranormal Operatives get a job as substitute teachers at the school and open an assembly doing a rap song. All of the kids look blankly at them in disbelief except for Class 3 who recognise Ms Wiz and join in with the song.

In American Psycho, Patrick Bateman tries to use black slang in a nightclub to show that he isn't just some boring yuppie:

"I stick out my hand at a crooked angle, trying to mimic a rapper. "Hey," I say. "I'm fresh. The freshest, y'know... like, uh, def... the deffest." I take a sip of champagne. "You know... def."

To prove this I spot a black guy with dreadlocks and I walk up to him and exclaim "Rasta Man!" and hold out my hand, anticipating a high-five."

Live-Action TV

In Happy Endings, Dave does this a lot in a season 2 episode, mostly about playing basketball with Brad and then all throughout the episode. He even lampshades how lame he sounds, and Brad asks him to stop.

Dave: Yo son, you ready to take the rock to the hole? Wassup son, we're street on this son!...*lowers his head in shame* I swam as a kid.

This continues throughout the episode. "You ready to ball it up, son?" "I know my hip hop, son!" "You know it. And1 son! And1! *Holds his hand out for a refused fist bump*...I'll get you inside"

Farscape's Aeryn's initial attempts at incorporating English into her speech are an interesting example. She tries to use English to be more relatable to John but he just gets annoyed and demands that she stop using English when she invariably butchers the language.

Joey does it on Friends when he tries to act like a nineteen-year-old for a role. "Playing Playstation? That's wack. Playstation is wack." "Sup with the wack Playstation sup?"

In one episode of Scrubs Carla tries to bond with a teenage patient by using the phrase "T.M.I." After a couple of seconds of the teen staring at her blankly, Dr Cox breaks the silence with "Okaaaay. Joshua, I'm going to have a quick word with your parents, so you stay here and chat with Nurse Early Nineties Catchphrases."

Dr Cox tries to talk to a 16 year old girlfriend with the following speech. It's one of the rare times he's not being sarcastic.

"Hey, Lindsey. What's up, girlfriend? It must be totally awesome to have the same name as that Lindsay Lohan".

Parodied in an episode of 8 Simple Rules where we get introduced to a wigger called Anthony who uses street lingo which Paul can't understand. At the end of the episode Cate uses the same lingo to make fun of him.

Hannah Montana had a dentist greet Miley with a lot of outdated 70s slang.

In Zits, Walt's attempts to use what he thinks is hip slang are a constant source of embarrassment to Jeremy.

Jeremy: Think outside the box? Dad, you are the box!

Later, Jeremy is alarmed when his dad does successfully use slang. This quotation returns things to normal:

Dad: What? I'm jiggy with the lingo!

Tabletop Games

In Planescape, the Planewalker's Handbook has both a glossary for the setting's slang and a guide to misusing said slang. It's titled "Cant Dictionary for the Clueless" and containing some humorous, ironic and sometimes downright antonymous misunderstandings of common expressions.

Theatre

In the musical Wonderful Town, Speedy Valenti hires Ruth as a barker for his swing club, handing her a flyer. She starts to read (and sing) in a very stiff manner that prompts one of the patrons to shout, "Hey, cats, get a load of that square!" When the hep cats start singing, however, she gets the message.

Shows up briefly towards the end of the stage musical version of Once:

Guy: Would you like to stay over with me tonight?

Girl: You mean hanky-panky?

Guy: I don't think anybody calls it "hanky panky" anymore...

Girl: Oh. Maybe that's why I haven't had any for a while.

Video Games

In Planescape: Torment, Annah mocks some not-so-lower-class thug wannabes for trying to speak the Sigil Cant and getting it wrong.

In Sly 3: Honor Among Thieves, Bentley tries to brief Dimitri on a diving mission, and attempts to sound like him. After sadly failing, Dimitri responds with, "My speech is like smoke! All over the place, but ungrabable!"

Parodied in an episode of Atop the Fourth Wall. Linkara points out that the dialogue one of the characters uses in the Nightcat comic sounds horribly out-dated That is, the comic was written in the 1990s but has slang that sounds like it came from the 1970s. This concept is then spoofed in a gag where 90s Kid points out how lame he thinks the dialogue of the comic is while he ''himself'' is speaking in outdated 1990s slang.

Aang from Avatar: The Last Airbender was doing this while under disguise in the Fire Nation. He kept calling everybody "hotman" and saying "flameo", to the confusion of everyone around him. Apparently the terms had become outdated during his 100-year nap in the iceberg.

Invader Zim does this with Poop Dawg, the Gangsta Clown who's supposed to encourage kids to sell candy. He asks the children is they want to 'go madness with da moneyzz?!' and pronounces the word 'prizes' like "pri-zai-zez" while dropping the word yo every other word. Both the children near him in person and those watching look totally lost after hearing him speak.

Dexter of Dexter's Laboratory does this in the episode "Average Joe", where he becomes convinced he's not a genius because an intelligence test he took in school came back "average", so he tries to act like an "average" kid by hanging out with some random guy his age and talking like this.

Kung Fu Panda Legends Of Awesomeness: Afraid he's going to be replaced because he's old and rusty (Chao was talking about a wok), Master Shifu a.k.a. the Shif-ster starts talking in slang to showboat his youth, vitality and mega-hipness. Then he breakdances. Of course, as a Kung Fu Grandmaster he breakdances quite well.

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